Orchids: A Flower With Power

Fans From Around The World Flock To New York City Show

(CBS) 
Now, Lee has a couple hundred plants in her Manhattan apartment, but since she specializes in miniature orchids, "it's not like a jungle in my living room."

"It's fascinating. You get so addicted," she said. "People can spend a fortune on special lights, humidifiers and fans to have constant air movement. It all depends on your degree of obsession."

Orchid obsession gained national notoriety in Susan Orleans' bestseller "The Orchid Thief" and subsequently the movie "Adaptation," but fascination with the flowers is long-standing. In Victorian England, the wealthy would send orchid hunters to exotic jungles to bring back rare species, and those especially taken with the plants were said to have "orchidelirium."


The draw is clear. With as many as 30,000 natural species, the incredibly varied plants have varieties that Orleans describes as looking like "butterflies, bats, ladies handbags," or like an "ethereal and beautiful flying white frog."

The plant also holds a certain mystique that may stem as much from collectors like CIA spy James Angelton or the way some collectors devote themselves entirely to the hobby, like Charles Darrow, the inventor of the game Monopoly who, according to Orleans, retired at 46 to spend time collecting and tending to orchids.

Marc Hachadourian, the curator of glasshouse collections at the New York Botanical Garden which has an annual orchid show, said orchids never fail to attract attention, whether it be the bright color of the Vandas, which are also called Rainbow Orchids, or the unique, delicate shape of the slipper orchid.

"Orchids have a longstanding history of being surrounded with legend and lore, a reputation for being exotic and beautiful," he said.

Considered the most highly evolved flowering plants on earth, there are constantly new hybrids and mutations that create a new orchid to collect — and orchid lovers come to the show with lists of species they want to find in hand. Right now, "Harlequin" orchids with vivid blotches of color are must-haves, said Meares.

Emiel and his wife Eliane Verloove were among the first in line Thursday afternoon waiting for the doors to open to the show. Eliane said she bought her first orchid many years ago, a small plant growing on a piece of bark that bloomed and grew for years, until she tried to divide it to give to friends, which killed it.

"I've been trying ever since," she said. "But so far, I'm not so lucky."

They have visited the show for many years, but this time they were on a mission to find an orchid to replace one that had recently died.

"I think we take too much care of them," Elaine said, laughing.